THE THREAD | Prepare ye the way for the new normal
The new normal is coming. Prepare ye the way. Make straight a path for what they are saying must be a return to the way things were before.
The rush of an economy, the mark it makes upon your time, the claims it makes upon your mind. Someone else’s wealth drives the next new normal. They are selling the novelty of normal to you, as if it must be the only thing you’ve ever wanted, as if desire has been reduced to On or Off, two digits, a hero born of ones and zeros. Here it comes to save the day!
The airwaves and screens are filled now with hopes of a promised land not too far off, a place where the small daily sufferings will cease. You will be asked to not grieve. You will be asked to stop noticing the failures in the system, the collatoral damage, the harm. Here's a check. You can now shop freely, return to the office for ten hours a day, redistribute your family across town.
The gadgets will once again bring you a car to take you to a restaurant or bar downtown and return you safely back home again. The gadgets will introduce you to new people, whom you can immediately rush out to meet in person to discover how much you might like or dislike or love or loathe them. The gadgets will show you endless real life events to which you can reply Attending or Not Attending or Interested without needing to commit one way or another. You can keep your options open because there are options. The gadgets will keep you busy enough to believe that this normal is your life in its entirety.
The new normal, coming up next. Give it a call. Send it a text. Let it know it can go ahead and come by whenever. You don’t have much else going on right now and you’re full of desire.
But before you rush forward into the promised land they’re selling you, take account of this odd year. Grieve the days of fog, the deaths, the missed chances, recall the uncertainty and anger -- don't let it all go just because they say so.
But also, remember the moments you might have missed otherwise:
The quiet streets last spring. So quiet you could take a long walk with your wife most mornings. So quiet you could walk down the middle of 39th Street without seeing a car. So quiet you could hear the songs of birds returning from their winters.
The hour spent on the floor with your sons listening to them talk about mythical creatures, these new creatures that were not around during your own childhood but have now appeared for your children, appeared to make them to believe that yes, the land and the mind are still the meeting place of so much magic.
The morning you walked around the block with your toddling daughter. The moment she took off running. The way her legs swung and her arms pumped, transforming in that very moment from toddler to kid, as if shedding a layer of skin right before your eyes.
The evening jogs through the park. The other joggers you would pass. How every pass was another chance to keep distance out of caution and respect. And how every pass was also a chance to reach out with a glance, a smile, a wave. Small gifts sent and received across a six-foot distance, reminding each other we are here. We are still here.
It’s not a return to normal that you want. It’s not the next new normal that they might commodify to fill your desire. No. It’s a carrying forward. It’s a bringing forth of all that you have found to be good and worth keeping: The gift of quick glances. Reminders of desires and hopes, how nourishing we can be to one another, and the site of so much magic in the world. The grief as well -- how it helps carry forward the love of what we've lost. All of this carrying forward. As if we have shed a layer of skin. As if we are not entirely different than we were before, and yet have become something changed.
Don’t talk now about how much this year has changed you. Be changed.
Enter this season like the birds returning from their winter: With a song.
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What I'm reading: John Williams' Stoner, Walter Brueggemann's "Voice as Counter to Violence"
What I'm listening to: Mathus & Bird's These 13, Courtney Marie Andrews' May Your Kindness Remain
What I'm watching: Martin Scorsese's No Direction Home
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Peace to you,
Andrew
BUSKER JAR: If you would like to support my writing projects this year through direct patronage, I would certainly welcome it! You can use my PayPal (andrewjohnsonkc@gmail.com) or Venmo (@Andrew-Johnson-45954). Thank you!